


To Sam

by kaffefilter



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Big Brother Dean, Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Love, Coda, Feels, Ficlet, Gen, Internal Monologue, idolisation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-11
Updated: 2014-12-11
Packaged: 2018-03-01 01:57:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2755307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaffefilter/pseuds/kaffefilter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I see him unchanged. 12 years old and still smarter than I could ever be. I still see hope for him."</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Sam

**Author's Note:**

> I remember writing this after the heart-wrenching episodes in season 9 when Sam is so mad at Dean he can't help dashing some hurt back, but it never got upleaded anywhere. I just remembered how everyone hated Sam then, and I hurt because Sam is so damn important. So I wrote this as some kind of love letter from Dean to Sam, brother to brother. An appreciation for what more Sam is than Dean's "job" to look after. Take it as you will.

Everyone thinks he has changed, but he hasn't. But they don't remember like I do. I remember how his face looked just like it does now, when he looks at you and begs with his eyes. His brow ridge is heavier now, and his eyebrows never draw up as high as before. Maybe it's because he used to be surprised more often. Or because he didn't have to frown as much.

I remember his nose better though. No one else alive has any idea how it used to be straighter, and rounder. He broke it once during a hunt, he was 14 and dad didn't even give it a second thought, just set it straight again when we got back to the motel room. He was still just a kid but not a word came out of him although tears pooled in his eyes at the pain. He knew already not to make a fuss about things. Dad gave me a good shouting about how I could let him get hurt, though. We both ate the words, it could have been so much worse. Why do memories like that stick with you? It was just another random injury. We get them all the time.

When he looks at me today I can sometimes see past the hate I know he has for what I've done, and it hurts to know he is still in there. Little Sammy with the dreams and the attitude that drove dad crazy, but also made him prouder of him than anyone could be.

For everything we've been through, he is still true to himself in ways I could never be. I let my anger cloud things, throw my morals out the window when they need to go, but Sam, he couldn't do that. All these years down the road, after all the terrible choices we've had to make, I still see him struggle every time we have to do something that clashes with his views. I wish I still did that.

But he has always been the better one, it was never spoken between any of us, but all the people who watched us grow up knew it. Sam was strong from the get go, he didn't really need me looking after him, but we all crowded around him to protect the good man we knew he was going to grow into.

I'm not sure any of us did a good job trying. We are different than him, set in our ways, impervious to growth. Sam never is. He rolls with the punches he gets, learns from both his own and my mistakes. And then he moulds it into more of his person. It's freaking amazing to watch.

So although he hates me now and avoids ever being near me in the bunker, when we work I see him the same as I always have. When we found the bunker I used to love down-time between the shit that always rolled around, but now I hate it. It means toeing around him, knowing if we even try to talk we go into the same endless looping conversation. So I sleep. Listen to music so loud I can't think, until we find something to work on and his facade of anger slips.

Then I feel at home. And I know he feels it too. But he always picks it back up. And it's not supposed to be like this. He never held a grudge like this, he acted on his emotions but thought through every consequence and took everyone into consideration. I'm supposed to be the petty one.

And it's so damn frustrating knowing he is still there; the brother I love and the man I wish I was much more like, and all he does is spend his time being mad at me for being my usual stupid self. Wishing everything had gone down a different road. He thinks I did it just for me, and although I know I can't live knowing I let him die, that's not all there is to it.

I see him unchanged. 12 years old and still smarter than I could ever be. I still see hope for him. And I still see everyone we know, supporting him from the other side. Because we know how amazing he is. How much more he deserves from life. If anyone is deserving of a life that ends happily, it's him. Me, dad, even Bobby; we knew how our lives were going to end. We were hunters through and through, didn't exactly love the job but damn well near it. Sam, he was always brought back into it because of us, our flaws and the things he had been taught. But he could be anything he wanted if we had let him. And I couldn't let him die before being any of it.

So tell me he's changed, that he will always be "the boy with the demon-blood" or a "blood-junkie", or tainted in some way, but I'll just smile at your ignorance. Sam has never changed into something else because of it. He still cares more than anyone I've known in this life. And he's more important than any of us. Because he is heart and brains and brawn. And growth and strength and innocence.

I'll never be half the man he is.


End file.
